Endurance Sport

MULTISPORT

Tuesday, 15 January 2008, 2:12 PM

Kayaking the Straits
By Rikki Johnson

I haven't always been a kayaker, strangely enough; once upon a time I used to play rugby, tennis and squash. That was until my first successful attempt of the Cook Strait back in 1988 with Grahame Dingle.

The conditions that day started off perfectly fine with not even a cloud in the sky, but as we approached the half way mark a 3 metre swell developed and 40 knot cross wind ensured we had to battle the rest of the way. If you know your weather, then you would know this is gale force conditions!

The trip took eight and a half hours from Cape Komaruru to Porirua Harbour, a memory that sticks with me to this day and keeps me from becoming complacent within the water realm of mother nature.

I was to hang up my paddle and place the kayak in the rafters for a few years, after a motor vehicle accident in 1990 left me with significant muscle and tissue loss to my lower right forearm, and took my elbow with it.

It wasn't until 2001 that the thought of becoming a disabled kayaker even entered my mind. As far as I was concerned my kayaking days were well and truly over as a result of the accident. However, I have never been one to quit and have spent most of my life fighting against the odds anyway.

So, after a few beers one night I agreed to a challenge that a good mate of mine brought forward, and I was to enter the realms of water yet again. I went back to the Kaipara harbour to train as I had been there many times before as an able bodied athlete and was familiar with the area.

Now, any kayaker that has achieved a Cook Strait crossing would know right away that it is a formidable foe and takes a lot of effort for an able bodied athlete, let alone one with no elbow.

I sort help from Brian Froggratt at Brains Gym, based in Dargaville. Brian is a left leg amputee with numerous sporting achievements under his belt, and I knew he would completely understand where I was coming from and what I wanted to achieve.

A rigorous four month training plan was established, complete with a few trips up and down the Kaipara Harbour thrown in for good measure. I experienced a fair bit of sunburn as I didnâ€™t have my spray skirt on, stupid me.Finally, in March 2006, after months of training and paddling up and down the Kaipara, I attempted the first crossing by a disabled kayaker across Cook Strait with the aid of a support vessel.

I must admit we had to do the event in reverse due to a weather front coming in by 6 hours. So, I guess you could say that from the torrential weather conditions experienced in 1988 it was a good decision to make and one that definitely paid off in the long run.

After leaving Ohaou Piont (Wellington side) we set off into the flat blue, strangely enough the tidal current was definitely noticeable & quite strong. It wasn't a bad paddle across, nowhere like the conditions we faced back in 1988, which of course in admittance was lying in the back of my mind. It wasn't until we were about two-thirds of the way across that it started to pick up and the closer I got to the South Island the more I could have sworn that it was deliberately moving further away from me.

But after 4 hours 8 minutes and 51 seconds I touched land just above Perano Head. I was so relieved that I had made it and proved myself to the critics in doing so!

The trip back across the Strait was quite choppy with the wind going in the opposite direction to the tide and of course creating white caps. I was definitely glad I had made the decision to start earlier than what I was originally going to. Had I started when I had planned to, I would have definitely hit the caps head on. At the end of the day I must say I was quite bushed and a little sore, surprisingly enough not actually in my non-existing elbow, but my lower left back had taken a hammering.

Word of my achievement spread and by next morning I was getting calls from Northland 800km away congratulating me on my gallant effort. So now that that feat was out of the way and I was still on a high from accomplishing a New Zealand First, I guess I tried to look in to the future and decide what was nextâ€¦why do one strait and not have ago at the other?

It was decided that an attempt was to be made on Foveaux Strait with the next 12 months. Now Foveaux Strait certainly doesnâ€™t have a very good reputation for being flat calm, so we had to put our thinking caps on for this attempt. First of all we needed some local knowledge.

We scouted around on the internet and found Mana Charters based in Bluff. Bob & Chris Hawkless were an amazing source of knowledge and let us know what we would be up against. Bob was to become my support boat for the crossing and a fine job he did indeed.

So back to the drawing board once again and of course to Brian Froggratt for some more training regimes. Trust me folks, Brian gets results.

Much of the focus is on the person whom does the deed, but I can assure you that I achieved what I achieved on Foveaux Strait because it was a team effort. This couldn't be more true than when we reached the eight nautical mile mark (of a twenty nautical mile trip). At eight miles in we broke a rudder steering cable, which trust me is not the thing that you really want to happen in the middle of Foveaux Strait, especially with a two and half metre swell all around you, but happen it did. With Terry Blakely hanging off the end of the boat in a bit of a balancing act for at least 20 minutes, we managed to achieve a temporary fix of the job at hand, good enough to at least get me to Bluff harbour. I feel I should mention that this is why I class the challenge as a team effort, because of little incidences like this that may arise unexpectedly that everybody has to work together to resolve.

Terry Bakely is an ex tug boat operator, so he like Bob Hawkless from Mana Charters has a vast knowledge of sea conditions and weather patterns. My other team members consisted of Sharlotte Walters from Unitech Waitakere, who is a librarian and researcher and very good at putting together insane challenges like these. It is surprising how much organising an event of this magnitude takes.

Now let us talk about how much it cost. Fortunately we were lucky as I funded the Cook Strait crossing myself, at a cost of approximately $3,000. I knew that the cost of this second crossing was going to be much greater considering there was 1400km between where I lived and where I was actually going to complete the event.

However, maybe the achievement of the Cook Straight crossing had more of an impact on people than I originally thought. As, when word got out that I was even entertaining the though of having a go at Foveaux Strait, offers starting came in. At the end of the day I believe there were 14 sponsors that wanted to see this achieved, especially by a New Zealander as a first in the disability sector.

I remember the first time I entered the Triple SSS store in Papakura to talk to Troy Wright the Managing Director, his simple words were if you want to do it I'll be with you all the way, and he was indeed true to his word. He never doubted my ability to do it and supported me all the way to the finish line. Lorraine from Parafed in Auckland who had heard about my previous adventures, contacted me and asked how they could be of help. To these two people I have the deepest respect and gratitude and I hope that by achieving what I did, it would be a little of the payment that I feel I owe them.

Many thanks to Wade from Q-Kayaks in Palmerston North who supplied the kayak and Mainfreight who shipped it to me free of charge. Kyra from Cannon who supplied the camera to shoot the film, I thank you for believing in me and giving me the chance to use your great products.

A very big thank you to my team mates and my son Daniel who took the pictures while I was busy kayaking. Thank you to Terry who fixed the kayak and Sharlotte Walters who we named â€œsecret squirrelâ€ (because she is so quiet but gets the job done) for organising it, and to Joe whose sense of humour and compassion kept us all going when stress levels got as high as they did.

Thank you for the southern hospitality I experienced, and thank you to all those critics that said I couldnâ€™t do it. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to prove you wrong, I totally enjoyed that.

May all that read this look as it as an accomplishment by an awesome team, of which I was just one of the links in the chain. It was because of this team effort that we succeeded and put the 'kiwi' back in 'kiwiana;' because when New Zealanders work together as a team we can achieve great things.

CYCLING